Chapter 1

On July 8, 2001, a sudden torrential rainstorm lashed the entire city of Haizhou, as if pouring with all its might.

Caught off guard, pedestrians hurriedly sought shelter under the eaves of nearby buildings. On the streets, apart from cars and a few scattered people with umbrellas, there was a young boy, drenched in mud and rain, running frantically in the downpour. In his arms, he clutched a transparent plastic file folder containing pens, pencils, erasers, and other stationery, as well as a college entrance exam admission ticket and an ID card.

The boy's name was Li Mu. At that moment, blood was seeping from a wound on his left forehead. Despite this, he continued to run like a madman, his frantic appearance drawing stares from passersby.

At that moment, Li Mu silently lamented, "Even after being reborn, I still couldn't avoid being hit by a car. If I had been reborn ten minutes earlier, it would have been better!"

Half an hour earlier, Li Mu, riding his bicycle to take the final English exam of the college entrance exam, was hit by a car while crossing a pedestrian walkway. He lost consciousness, and an ambulance rushed him to the hospital. Unexpectedly, Li Mu woke up before the ambulance reached the hospital.

However, the Li Mu who woke up was no longer the same boy who had been hit. Although they were the same person, the one who awoke was Li Mu from fifteen years later.

Before his rebirth, Li Mu was working overtime writing code. As he wrote, it seemed to get dark, and he lost consciousness as if he had fallen into a deep sleep. When he awoke, he was already in the ambulance.

It took Li Mu several minutes to realize he had been reborn. In his memory, the car accident that occurred today had changed his life.

At 3:00 PM that afternoon, it was the English exam, the last subject of the college entrance exam.

In his previous life, after being hit by a car, Li Mu did not wake up as quickly as he did this time. When he awoke, he was already in the hospital, and it was 3:15 PM, fifteen minutes into the English exam.

Ignoring the objections of the doctor and the beautiful female driver who caused the accident, Li Mu insisted on going to the exam. After a quick examination, the doctor found no serious injuries and, along with the traffic police and the female driver, took Li Mu back to the exam venue in the ambulance.

When Li Mu arrived at the exam venue, he was already 35 minutes late. According to the rules, anyone more than 30 minutes late was not allowed to enter. However, due to Li Mu's special circumstances and the guarantees provided by the traffic police and the doctor, he was allowed to enter. By then, the listening section of the English exam was almost over.

At that time, Li Mu's mental fortitude was not strong, and the delay in the listening section severely affected his performance. He scored only 49 points in English.

Due to the low English score, Li Mu's total score in the college entrance exam was 535 points, 5 points short of the threshold for the first-tier universities. He ended up enrolling in a second-tier provincial technical university.

In his previous life, his parents and the female driver who caused the accident all hoped he would retake the exam. The female driver even offered to cover all the expenses for his retake. However, considering his family's situation, Li Mu wanted to graduate and start working to earn money, so he gave up the retake.

Later, Li Mu never saw the female driver again. It wasn't until 2015, when he was working in Yanjing, that his parents suddenly called him to return home for a funeral. It was then that he learned the woman who had hit him, Chen Wan, had passed away. She had been a host of a provincial TV variety show, not a major star but well-known in the province.

His parents also told him that after the accident, Chen Wan had secretly paid for his four years of college tuition, a fact they had kept from him out of respect for her wishes.

Her death was also tragic: her father was sentenced to death with a reprieve for illegal fundraising, her husband lost all their assets in the stock market crash and disappeared, and a local unscrupulous media outlet published distorted reports about her, causing her great distress. She turned to alcohol to cope and died from alcohol poisoning.

Upon learning all this, Li Mu felt a deep sense of gratitude towards her. So when he ran out of the ambulance, he turned back to the beautiful woman who was about to chase after him and said, "Don't follow me. It's not your fault. Just remember, never play with stocks recklessly!"

Li Mu had never blamed her in his previous life, and he certainly wouldn't blame her now.

As for the tragedy that would unfold years later, Li Mu could not do much to warn her at the moment.

The electronic watch on his wrist showed it was 2:50 PM, ten minutes before the exam and less than a kilometer from his exam venue.

"There's still time!" Li Mu didn't have time to savor the excitement of being reborn. His mind was preoccupied with the upcoming English exam. If he failed this subject again, what would he do?

In his previous life, Li Mu didn't understand the difference between a second-tier and a first-tier university. However, after working as a programmer in Yanjing for eleven years, he knew all too well the importance of a good education!

Before his rebirth, Li Mu worked at a large internet company in Yanjing. His colleagues, who were about the same age and had graduated from prestigious universities, were mostly directors or vice-presidents, earning at least 500,000 yuan annually. Due to his lack of a good degree, Li Mu could only be a so-called senior engineer, with an annual salary of only about 200,000 yuan, which was quite mediocre for someone with eleven years of work experience.

Li Mu often regretted not retaking the exam to get into a better university. If he had, his life might have taken a different path. Perhaps he could have bought a house in Yanjing in his thirties, or his three failed relationships might not have ended in failure, or he might have been able to bring his parents to enjoy a better life.

Li Mu had often fantasized about whether life offered a chance to start over at a certain point.

If so, he could have corrected many of his life's regrets.

For example, going back to before his senior year of high school to prevent the failure of his 2001 college entrance exam;

For example, going back to his teenage years to be more considerate and less rebellious towards his parents, so they wouldn't have aged so quickly;

For example, he could have confessed to his long-time crush, Su Yingxue, on a sunny afternoon, and even if she rejected him, he could have reset to the moment before the confession and continue being friends, rather than giving up the idea of confessing out of fear of losing her friendship.

Unexpectedly, he had really returned to this pivotal moment in his life!

However, being reborn and immediately getting hit by a car, and then having to rush to the exam with an injured body, was indeed a harsh turn of events.

Moreover, he had long forgotten the questions from the English exam fifteen years ago, so his score was still a big question mark.

Thinking about how his parents had never gotten over his poor performance in the college entrance exam, Li Mu felt even more pressure.

What a nightmare!

Thinking too much was pointless; he should just do his best in the exam.

...

Fortunately, Haizhou was a small fifth-tier city with a limited downtown area. Li Mu was very familiar with the city from his pre-university days, so he ran with ease and finally arrived at his exam venue just as the bell rang.

As he reached the entrance of the exam venue, a male invigilator was standing there. Before Li Mu could enter, the invigilator stopped him, looking at him in surprise and frowning, "What are you doing here?"

"I'm here to take the exam."

The other two invigilators and over thirty students in the classroom were stunned by Li Mu's appearance. A tall boy, about 1.8 meters, drenched in mud and rain, with blood on his face and half of his white T-shirt stained red, the rain making the blood even more noticeable.

The female invigilator, who was opening the sealed exam paper, was so shocked that she stopped her actions. She was new to this exam venue and had never seen Li Mu before.

The male invigilator, who had stopped Li Mu at the door, frowned and sternly said, "How can you come to take the college entrance exam like this? What kind of behavior is this! Do you think the exam venue is your living room? Dry yourself off first before you come in!"